June Edmonds

June Edmonds uses abstract painting to explore how color, repetition,
movement, and balance can serve as conduits to spiritual contemplation and
interpersonal connection to her African-American roots. Exploring the
psychological construct of skin color or tone through pattern and abstract painting
has proven to be a revealing gesture and these ideas are explored in her two
ongoing series: the Energy Wheel Paintings inspired by her meditation practice
and her Flag Paintings, which explore the alignment of multiple identities such as
race, nationality, gender, or political leanings.
June Edmonds was born in Los Angeles, where she lives and works.
Edmonds received her MFA from Tyler School of Art, Philadelphia, and a
bachelor’s degree from San Diego State University. She also attended
Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture and is the recipient of the 2022
Guggenheim Fellowship, the California Community Foundation Fellowship for
Visual Artists, inaugural 2020 AWARE Prize, presented by the French non-profit
Archive of Women Artists Research and Exhibitions; a 2018 City of Los Angeles
Individual Artist Grant (COLA) and Exhibition at the Los Angeles Municipal Art
Gallery; a California Arts Council Individual Artist Grant. Edmonds has done
residencies in Vermont at the Vermont Studio Center in 2022 and Paducah Artist
Residency in Kentucky in 2017. In 2023 she will be going to Ucross in Wyoming
and MacDowell in New Hampshire.
Edmonds has exhibited at the Riverside Art Museum, the California African
American Museum, the Los Angeles Municipal Art Gallery, the Luckman Fine Art
Gallery at Cal State Los Angeles, Watts Tower Art Center in Los Angeles, CA;
Angels Gate Art Center in San Pedro, CA; and the Manhattan Beach Art Center
in Manhattan Beach, CA. Edmonds has completed several works of public art
with the city of Los Angeles and the Department of Cultural Affairs, an installation
at the MTA Pacific Station in Long Beach, CA and a mural with Murals of La Jolla
in 2021. Her paintings are held in collections throughout the United States
including the California African American Museum, Los Angeles; Mead Art
Museum, Amhurst College, Amhurst, MA; Davis Museum, Wellesley College,
Wellesley, MA;, CA; David Owsley Museum of Art at Ball State University,
Muncie, IN; The Pizzuti Collection, Columbus, OH; as well as Rodney M. Miller
Collection, New York, NY; Michael Rubel Collection, Los Angeles, CA: David
Rogath Collection, Greenwich, CT; and Kelly Williams and Andrew
Forsyth Collection, Palm Beach, FL among others.